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ALFRED
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WORKING PAPER
SLOAN SCHOOL OF MANAGEMENT
OUTWARD BOUND:
STRATEGIES FOR TEAM SURVIVAL
IN THE ORGANIZATION
DEBORAH GLADSTEIN ANCONA
APRIL, 1989
WP
//:
3006-89-BPS
MASSACHUSETTS
INSTITUTE OF TECHNOLOGY
50 MEMORIAL DRIVE
CAMBRIDGE, MASSACHUSETTS 02139
JMASS.
MAY
iN!^T.
TECH.
4 1989
OUTWARD BOUND:
STRATEGIES FOR TEAM SURVIVAL
IN THE ORGANIZATION
DEBORAH GLADSTEIN ANCONA
APRIL, 1989
WP
//:
3006-89-BPS
I would like to thank Lotte
Bailyn, Connie Gersick,
Debbie Kolb, and Ed Schein for their helpful commentary.
ABSTRACT
Using the external perspective as a research lens, this study examines
team-context interaction in five consulting teams.
The data show three
strategies toward the environment: informing, parading, and probing.
Probing
teams revise their knowledge of the environment through external contact,
initiate programs with outsiders, and promote their team achievements within
They are rated the highest performers, although member
the organization.
satisfaction and cohesiveness suffer in the short run. Results suggest that
external activities are better predictors of team performance than internal
group processes for teams facing external dependence.
Teams are in the midst of
a
Although teams(l)
renaissance (Goodman, 1986).
are hardly new organization phenomena,
the recent emphasis on teams as a
fundamental unit, of the organization structure is different (Drucker, 1988).
Perhaps we finally are taking groups seriously.
Whether it is newly created
teams to service financial accounts at Goldman Sachs (Maister, 1985), or to
develop new products at General Motors and Procter and Gamble, or to implement
new manufacturing strategies in the aerospace industry (Kazanjian & Drazin,
1986) this new and different form of group is proliferating (Gersick,
1988).
One difference is in the increased amount of autonomy and responsibility
granted to the team in an attempt to achieve flexibility in
a
competitive,
rapidly changing marketplace (Ancona & Caldwell, 1989; Kanter, 1983).
A second
change is the increased use of cross-functional teams, groups put together to
accomplish
a
particular task through part-time members who have concurrent
commitments to other parts of the organization (Galbraith, 1982).
Finally,
in
response to new environmental challenges, teams are called upon more and more
to span traditional boundaries both inside the firm (providing a closer
coupling among diverse functional units) and outside the firm (providing a link
to customers,
suppliers, or competitors)
(Clark & Fujimoto, 1987; Von Hippel,
1988).
This study tracks the development of some of these new, part-time, more
autonomous, and externally-oriented, teams.
Using
a
framework called the
external perspective (Ancona, 1987), this research examines the on-going
relationship between five consulting teams and their environment.
The
environment includes both the organization in which the teams are situated and
those outside the organization that are serviced by the teams.
A secondary
interest is examining the relationships among external activity, internal team
activity, and subsequent team performance.
THEORY
Both social psychology with its emphasis on group process, and organization
design which views teams as
analyze team behavior.
form.
(2).
a
structural form, seem appropriate frameworks to
Yet both may have limited application to this new team
Group process models have tended to treat the group as
a
closed system
This is particularly true of the humanistic and decision-making schools
which rely on laboratory and training research where group context is
controlled in order to obtain
a
fine-grained analysis of internal group
activity (Gladstein, 1984; Goodman, 1986; Hackman & Morris, 1975).
However,
organization teams, charged with the task of spanning traditional boundaries,
are open systems requiring complex interactions with people beyond their
borders.
For this reason it is important to extend our theoretical lens from
the team boundary outward.
Organization design models view teams as
a
vehicle to manage uncertainty
and interdependence that is not adequately handled in the organizational
hierarchy (Galbraith, 1977; Tushman & Nadler, 1988).
Unlike the group process
models which focus on the activities of free actors, organization design models
focus on structural constraint.
The team is viewed as the solution to a design
problem and hence there is an implicit assumption of structural determinism;
the structure will direct team behavior to meet uncertainty requirements.
Yet
there is mounting support for less extreme models in which "there is no sense
in which structure determines action or vice versa"
(Giddens, 1984; p. 219).
According to Giddens, there are clearly constraints on action brought about by
structures, but actors can make a difference.
Therefore, analysis of behavior
using this model monitors the interaction between activities and conditions in
the environment.
Structure is both constraining and enabling, and patterned
action becomes structure.
For the study of teams this suggest monitoring
team-environment interaction, and mutual influence over time.
The External Perspective
In contrast 'to traditional models of group process the external perspective
looks outward from the group boundary.
The focus shifts to the group in its
context, and the group is assumed to have an existence and purpose apart from
serving as
1986).
a
setting and apart from the individuals who compose it (Pfeffer,
The question is no longer "How does the group influence individuals?"
but "How does the organization influence the group?"
individuals build
a
Rather than "How do
cognitive map of the group?" the question is "How do group
men±>ers map and reach out to their environment?"
Following Giddens (1984)
structuration model however, the emphasis is not solely on team initiatives or
environmental influence but on the interplay between team and environment.
Finally, internal team activities are not ignored, but rather than studying
decision making or roles per se, our interest is the internal processes that
influence, and are influenced by, those in the environment (Ancona, 1987).
There has been partial application of the external perspective in groups
(3).
One study of a hundred sales teams shows that team members conceptualize
group process as two separate sets of activities: intragroup activities and
cross-boundary activities to coordinate work with outside groups (Gladstein,
1984).
A series of other studies have documented a variety of external
activities and roles that link teams to their environment.
For example,
studies of research and development teams have documented boundary spanners,
stars, and gatekeepers, who import needed technical information from outside
the group (see Allen,
1984; Katz & Tushman,
1981; Tushman,
1977; 1979).
In a
study of new product teams Ancona and Caldwell (1988) show that groups use
external contacts not only to obtain technical information, but also to create
a
mapping of resources, support, and trends in the organization, to influence
those with resources, and to synchronize work flow.
Gersick (1988) moves beyond description of specific external activities to
a
process model of interaction with the environment.
In a study of eight
temporary task forces, she finds that groups respond to feedback and
information from the environment only at certain points in their life-cycle.
The group can be influenced at the first meeting when basic approaches to work
are set up, and at a midpoint transition when the group is looking for outside
feedback to reformulate an understanding of external demands and how to meet
them.
In contrast,
the two major phases of work activity (from the first
meeting to the midpoint, and from the midpoint to completion) are closed
periods when the group is not likely to alter its basic direction (Gersick,
1988; Hackman & Walton,
1986).
This paper extends Gersick'
s
approach to studying the on-going interaction
between teams and their environments.
Gersick has identified
a
pattern of
interaction, here we seek to identify the specific content of that
interaction.
For example, we know that in the first meeting basic approaches
to work are set up,
but we do not know what those approaches are.
This
research searches for the strategies that teams in context use to manage the
tension between internal and external demands.
that the environment influences the group.
We know from Gersick'
s
research
This research aims to understand
what part of the environment influences the group, how it does so, and how the
group in turn influences the environment.
performance as
a
Finally, this research adds group
key variable in order to generate normative propositions.
Extensions of the External Perspective
We know from previous research that groups develop norms about their task,
interpersonal behavior, and group-context interaction quickly, sometimes in the
first few minutes of their first meeting (Bettenhausen & Murnighan, 1985;
Gersick, 1988; Schein, 1988).
Team members bring scripts--sequences of
activity to follow--developed from other group experiences to apply to the new
group situation •<Abelson, 1976; Taylor, Crockcer & D'Agostino, 1978).
words, a group is not a tabula rasa
In other
Existing scripts include both implicit
.
and explicit strategies that will guide the early actions of the team
(Bettenhausen & Murnighan, 1985).
This research seeks to document those
strategies relating to the external environment.
Internal interaction can be categorized along
a
number of dimensions, e.g.,
autocratic, consultative, or democratic (Vroom and Jago, 1974).
The goal of
this research is to derive some dimensions that can be used to describe group
behavior with the external environment.
and closed, to describe whether or not
Researchers have used the terms open
a
group's boundaries are permeable to
external transactions (Alderfer, 1976; Ancona & Caldwell, 1988), but my goal is
to specify a more developed,
empirically based, model of external interaction.
A second goal is to develop an understanding of the role of the environment
in interaction with the teams.
The environment is said to influence a group by
providing feedback about how well the group is meeting its demands (Gersick,
1988).
But how does this influence occur?
is diverse and has disparate demands
What happens when the environment
(Tsui,
1987)?
What if parts of the
environment have vague or unclear demands--can those demands then be shaped by
the group?
Going back to Giddens (1984), and the debate between strategic
choice and environmental determinism (Astley & Van de Ven, 1983), this research
investigates both the nature of the constraints imposed by the environment and
how teams can make
a
difference.
Finally, we still know very little about how external activity relates to
internal activity and performance.
Most texts designed to help a team function
effectively emphasize internal activity.
Priorities tend to include
establishing norms of how to work together, agreeing on expectations for group
member input and performance, and setting boundaries between the individual and
the group around issues of intimacy and authority (see Bales,
Schein, 1988).
Yet,
1983; Dyer,
1977;
from an external perspective, teams that manage their
external dependence and are able to obtain critical resources become better
performers (Pfeffer, 1972; 1986; Pfeffer & Salancik, 1978).
These divergent
views of the precursors of performance raise two fundamental questions: What is
the nature of the interaction between developing an internal mode of operation
and external one, i.e., do the two occur simultaneously, and does the
development of one interfere with, or facilitate the development of the other?
Finally, which set of activities, internal or external, are most predictive of
performance?
PROJECT HISTORY
Early in 1982
a
state education commissioner decided to restructure his
department to improve coordination among divisions, to provide more uniform
service across geographic areas, and to improve the reputation of the
department in the field.
He hired several faculty members from a New England
business school to help with this reorganization.
I
taught some organization
structure concepts to a cross-level design team in the department.
created several design options to present to the commissioner.
structure,
I
Members
Once he chose a
was permitted to monitor the new teams.
The New Organization Structure
The original organization was along functional lines, with consultants
(e.g., reading specialist) reporting to one of six division heads in areas such
as elementary, vocational,
and special education.
The new department structure
has consultants "reporting" both to a functional unit head and to a regional
team leader (see Figure 1).
"Reporting" is somewhat of
a
misnomer, for team
members are at the same hierarchical level as leaders, although leaders have
more responsibility and receive
teams'
a
small, additional, stipend.
The regional
act as generalists to diagnose, and serve the needs of their regions,
and to improve interunit coordination.
Thus, team members might go into a
school district and interview teachers about their needs for curriculum change,
then put together a new course design to meet those needs using the varied
resources of the department.
The vice commissioner (VC) supervises the activities of the regional teams,
while functional unit chiefs report to division heads who report to the
commissioner.
The head of human resources has the role of resource,
facilitator, and evaluator of the new design.
Implementation
In the Fall of 1982, when the design had been selected,
the VC,
the commissioner,
and the head of human resources, chose regional team leaders from a set
of inside consultants who had applied for the position.
consultants to teams.
Assignments attempted to create cross-functional teams,
with members of roughly equivalent interpersonal skills.
assigned to
a
They also assigned
Each team was
geographic area.
Once the leaders had been chosen, Walter, the leader of the W team,
scheduled informal meetings of the team leaders so that they could act as
sounding board for each other.
a
These meetings were forbidden when the VC found
out that such meetings were taking place without him.
In late December the entire department met off-site.
a
The commissioner gave
supportive speech, and the staff who had helped to design the new structure
put together skits to illustrate how the new organization would work.
the teams were created.
And so
Teams had to decide how to "serve the needs of their
regions" and allocate members' time between team and functional activities.
Team leader meetings were formalized and run by the VC.
In January and February of 1983 the teams began to generate plans on
The commissioner then decided that he did not want each
serving their regions.
team to do different things, so he told the leaders to plan a unified approach.
When
a
few weeks went by and he saw no results, he told the teams to create
profile of their regions and to develop
a
a
workshop to communicate "promising
practices" observed in particular schools to the rest of the region.
From
research point of view, these regional teams are exemplars of
a
group given
a
general task
with part-time members
are new
,
the organization.
with autonomy to complete that task as they like,
and external demands
they must define
,
,
a
new
a
.
Specifically because the teams
role and learn to function with existing parts of
Members must work inter dependent ly to produce a service of
importance to the organization.
and well-defined group boundaries
There is formal leadership within the team,
Teams are evaluated by upper levels of
.
management, and they serve the needs of an external constituency.
Hence,
field is open for teams to define both internal and external behavior.
the
This
paper traces how they did that and how they performed.
METHODOLOGY
The exploratory nature of the research led to an inductive study of the
external activity in five teams' natural environment.
Most consultants, who
came from a variety of units, knew each other by sight but had never worked
Their new task was serving school districts in given geographic
together.
areas.
Teams ranged in size from six to ten.
Data Sources
Using
a
multi-method approach,
of their existence.
I
followed teams for the first five months
Data collection focused on three sets of variables that
provided information to answer the research questions.
First, data on team-leader plans were collected right after the teams had
been formed.
Interviews were designed to ascertain implicit and explicit
strategies toward the environment.
Given time restraints,
I
chose team leaders
to interview under the assumption that they would have the most influence over
team norm formation.
Second,
I
monitored interaction the team had with outsiders using
questionnaires, logs, interviews, and observation.
Key actors in the teams'
environment were the task allocators and performance evaluators within the
organization (the commissioner and VC) and those outside the organization who
were the recipients of team services (superintendents of school districts).
Third,
I
assessed internal group process and outcomes to gauge the
interaction of internal process, external process, and effectiveness.
Team
satisfaction and cohesiveness data were collected as were performance ratings
made by outsiders.
These external ratings were collected later on in order to
allow for the lag effects between process and performance (Gladstein, 1984).
Team Leader Strategies.
In early January 1983,
about their plans for the teams, using
a
I
interviewed team leaders
semistructured format.
Interviews
lasted from one to two hours, and were tape recorded, then transcribed.
The
first set of questions were general ones about initial team goals and
anticipated early leadership and team activities.
The intent was not to prompt
issues about external interactions, but to assess whether these issues were
brought up at all.
The second set of questions probed for specifics about
external activity; was any planned, with whom, of what type?
Team-Context Interaction
.
In order to monitor interaction from January
through May, questionnaires, logs, observation, and internal documentation were
used.
First, a questionnaire was distributed in late February to all team
members.
Questions were taken from several sources: Hackman, 1982; Van de Ven
& Ferry, 1980; and Gladstein,
Questions addressed interaction with the
1984.
regions (difficulty in predicting the needs of the region), and interaction
with the commissioner's office (difficulty of figuring out management
expectations, team and organizational goal congruence, and amount of
communication with upper levels in the organization).
required to rate items on 5-point Likert scales.
Respondents were
All team members received
questionnaires with envelopes for direct return to the researcher.
questionnaires were returned for
a
Seventeen
response rate of 47%.
Second, all team members kept a log of the number of personal visits to
each school district.
The head of human resources required that this log be
kept as input into the evaluation of the new organizational design.
reported on
Data are
two-month period.
a
Third, the author and a research assistant, both observed team meetings
throughout the five-month period (an average of 2.4 meetings per group).
The
author alone sat in on seven out of the nine team leader meetings and met
several times with the commissioner and VC to get their reactions to team
progress.
Notes taken during meetings aimed to capture both how teams
discussed their environments and how they organized themselves to meet external
demands.
Beyond this general goal, note-taking followed an open-ended
technique using three columns: observations, interpretations, and patterns (see
Hanlon, 1980).
Finally,
throughout the entire period, we asked team leaders to send us
agendas, minutes, notes, and other written material originating in their teams,
which helped us to track team events.
Team Performance.
outsiders.
Team outcomes were assessed both by team members and
The February questionnaire required assessments of group
cohesiveness and member satisfaction.
In May,
10
right before our observation
ended, we interviewed a member of each team selected at random.
This interview
was open-ended, focusing on evaluations of the team's strengths and weaknesses,
major activities, and areas for improvement.
The following January the author met with the commissioner and the head of
human resources (the VC had left the organization) for evaluation of the teams
a
year after their formation.
I
asked them to rank order the teams along the
same dimensions used in their formal evaluations of the teams and to explain
their rationale.
Superintendent ratings of the teams had been obtained by the
head of human resources and were given to me.
She had sent out surveys asking
whether the team structure had resulted in better, worse, or the same service
as the year before.
Data Analysis
Inductive research does not follow an established format of analysis
(Glaser & Strauss, 1967; Yin, 1984).
a tracking,
multi-method approach.
In this study
I
used what might be called
The analysis had three components: 1)
content analysis of team leader plans to determine strategies, 2) development
of team profiles assessing internal process and team-environment interaction,
and later performance, and 3) assessment of proposed relationships among the
key constructs.
Deriving Strategies.
Once the interview data were collected from the team
leaders, the author and research assistant reviewed the transcripts and listed
all references to planned interaction with outsiders on index cards.
We also
recorded references to what might be called non-interaction,- for example, a
leader might speak of not wanting to respond to initiatives from outsiders.
Included were references both to interaction that the group would initiate and
that outsiders would initiate.
Finally, we recorded plans for internal group
activity because this, too, was part of the leader's overall strategy.
11
For
example, if the key goal for one team leader was fostering communication within
that told
the team while it was building a reputation in the field to another,
us something about internal versus external priorities.
Once we had index cards for all five groups we coded each entry on the
Then we
dimensions it seemed to represent, e.g., frequency of interaction.
This lead
identified similarities and differences among the stated approaches.
to the grouping of teams into three categories,
representing different
strategies toward the environment, that will be explained below.
Developing Profiles.
Based on the activities of the teams, we developed
team profiles--short summaries of key processes and performance.
In developing
the profiles we were most interested in team-context interaction, particularly
with respect to the commissioner's office and the school districts.
We kept
a
log of all documentation from the project and whenever we had about twenty-five
new entries we would each review them and discuss how team profiles needed to
be changed.
In cases where we disagreed, we tried to understand why,
and to
determine if additional data could help to clarify the issue.
From here the design evolved.
a
Viewing research as
a
cognitive, rather than
validation, process we continuously alternated between concept formulation
and data collection (Bailyn, 1977).
In the first few weeks of the new design,
team meetings were often sporadic, and considerable information was passed
along between meetings.
A questionnaire seemed required to tap into member
perceptions of external interaction that were not mentioned during meetings.
In the case of a particular team with infrequent meetings and the lowest survey
When we
response rate, we set up an interview to fill in missing information.
found that the most information about team activities was communicated during
team-leader meetings and then transmitted throughout the organization
to attend as many of these meetings as possible.
12
In particular,
I
decided
the April
meeting was coined the "show and tell" meeting because team leaders had to
report on their teams' progress to date.
In putting together profiles, however, we focused on process and
performance information that was corroborated by another source.
We tried to
get independent assessments of what was going on from multiple individuals
through multiple methods, e.g., member interviews, management rankings, and
superintendent assessments.
as a "problem"
team,
In one example,
the commissioner spoke of one team
and team meeting and interview data supported this.
In
another instance, however, the commissioner noted another team seemed to be
doing very little, while the team leader and members saw themselves as very
busy and productive.
Conflicting reports became part of the data base.
We
also tried to get parallel data from each group, independent of its early
categorization; not knowing whether
a
team would follow its leader's plans we
did not want to reify the strategies.
Assessing Relationships.
We now had data on team strategies, actual
interaction patterns, and performance.
What emerged from numerous discussions
and immersion in the data are some proposed relationships among these variable
sets that await testing by future researchers.
RESULTS
Team Leader Strategies
Our analysis of team leader plans suggested three different strategies
toward the environment.
A strategy of informing involves concentration on
internal team process until the team is ready to inform outsiders of its
intentions; a strategy of parading consists of internal team building but
simultaneously being visible in order to let outsiders know that members know
and care about them; and
a
strategy of probing stresses external processes and
requires team members to have
a
lot of interaction with outsiders to diagnose
13
their needs and experiment with solutions to meet those needs.
An example and
analysis of each type will explain this further.
Victor: A strategy of Informing
The first goal is to foster sensitivity to opening communications.
Goals
We have to struggle with this nebulous goal, struggle with the mechanisms of
how we are going to function. This must be done before anything else.
I'll be laid back and let people work, as opposed to being
Leadership.
I'll be a facilitator and supportive.
My
authoritarian and directive.
greatest task will be to keep up the enthusiasm of the group.
Interaction With the Districts. We need to build our understanding of each
other and the districts that we are working in--share our experiences and
gather some information about the needs in our territory. We need to gather
information, talk about it, digest it, and decide if it is important or not.
At first we may have to sift through some very unimportant information until we
Somewhere along the
get a feeling for the kinds of things that are important.
line we are going to need a lot of input and a lot of exchange of information
back and forth between the department and the local level. We will want them
(the teachers and administrators in the school districts) to know about school
approval (one of the designated interventions in the district) long before we
implement it.
Walter:
A Strategy of Parading
Goals.
Develop a team understanding of what we are about, the matrix
concept.
Make them comfortable wearing those shoes, comfortable working with
each other. Then it will depend on the regions--we won't hit those that are
most hurt, but go after major needs that most have.
My job is to get
Leadership.
To facilitate, coordinate, inform, smooth.
the job done within the region, a team member's job is to understand the matrix
and work within it so we all function as a smooth operating group.
Interaction With the Region.
Develop a regional profile, sharing
information that we have--the information and perspectives that we have about
each of the districts; put that together and synthesize it so that we know what
our region looks like.
Be visible.
Let them know that we are here, but stay
away from crises dropped in our laps.
Develop our priorities and let them know
what we want to do.
Yurgen:
A Strategy of Probing
Goals.
I think the first requirement of a team is to become fairly
familiar with the region to which they have been assigned.
Leadership.
I
probably have the prime responsibility for selling this
14
concept to the local leadership, superintendents, principals, what have you.
Everyone has got to be involved, but I have the most direction.
I think it is going to take a major effort to
Interaction with the Region.
gain credibility- and the methods used are going to have to be tailored to each
district.
The first task is to get them to express their needs for services.
Sell yourself to these people: this is what we can bring you, tell us what your
needs are and we will design something to address those.
If we do not do this
we lose our customers.
We have each been operating in our own sphere so even though I have
knowledge of every district up there, I have been looking at it from one point
We all need to broaden our perspective and see what they see their
of view.
needs to be.
One of the striking differences among team leader strategies is their view
of when and how to interact with their regions.
Victor's strategy of informing
has a primary goal of creating an enthusiastic team with open communications
among members, and clear group goals.
Initially, the level of outside contact
will be low (only "somewhere along the line" does Victor anticipate a lot of
interaction with the field)
.
Even when Victor discusses interaction with the
districts, he speaks of "sharing our experiences," i.e., the data we already
have, and the need to "sift through ... information," i.e., reference data that
is written and stored,
rather than newly collected.
Furthermore, judgment
about what is important in the field is made by the group "deciding if it is
important or not," and only later communicated to the districts: "we will want
them to know about school approval long before we implement it."
In short,
this team will inform outsiders when it decides what its approach will be.
Walter's strategy of parading (to march or walk through or around) adds to
the emphasis on internal team building the need to go out and be visible in the
field.
Like Victor, Walter wants his team to work on becoming a "smooth
operating group," and like Victor, he sees his team as mapping the environment,
or "figuring out what our region looks like," by using data that team members
already have.
Similarly, Walter plans to have his team develop priorities that
In fact, Walter intends to stay away
are then communicated to the districts.
15
from the communications initiated by the districts; "crises dropped in our
laps" that may move the team away from what they plan to do for the majority.
In contrast to Victor, however, Walter plans a higher level of interaction
in the field in order to be visible,
and to "let them know we are here".
This
notion of external visibility or parading, is even more vividly explained by
Xena, who shares this strategy:
Find out
Try and visit all the superintendents, and visit all the schools.
time.
out
each
team
member
of
the
different
Take a
about their unique styles.
want
region,
I
my
every
building
in
I've
in
been
I want to be able to say that
be
and
meetings
superintendents'
to circulate, to be familiar, to go to
introduced to improve my reputation. People should feel comfortable calling us
and getting help."
While Xena does not mind, and in fact, welcomes, the external initiatives
of those in need, her team's initiatives into the field, like Walter's, are to
be aimed at obtaining visibility and familiarity.
This goal of visibility
differentiates the parading from the informing strategy.
Yurgen's strategy of probing calls for high levels of two-way communication
with the external environment, not solely for visibility, but to broaden the
perspective of team members, to diagnose the needs of the regions, to obtain
feedback on team ideas, and to "sell" the services of the team to the
"customer".
Yurgen, in contrast to all the other team leaders, sees external
He does not believe that his team
activity as the first and primary goal.
members currently have all the data they need to put together a plan for the
region.
They have information about the districts, but that information is
limited in that it has been obtained using
a
different frame or mindset: "I
have been looking at it from one point of view" (in this case as a specialist
rather than the new role of generalist and consultant).
Yurgen plans to promote a new viewpoint through a very interactive approach
to the environment.
The interaction consists of hearing the needs of the
region as expressed by people in that region, "get them to express their need
16
for services," then testing whether the team's plans to meet those needs are
adequate.
The model here is of a salesperson creating a customized product who
wants to make sure to select the options that will satisfy the customer.
Zoro, the other leader in this study who plans a probing strategy,
envisions this same widening of team member perspective, and reciprocal
give-and-take communication with the environment.
.We
Can we move people from their vertical position to being generalists?
definitely need to go to the districts and talk to teachers, principals,
administrators, and board people and say to them, "Are things different now?
Are things better? Are you being serviced better over the total educational
picture?" We want to be more visible, and we want to find out their needs and
develop strategies to meet those needs. We are going to attend the regional
Then we will visit superintendents in their home
superintendents' meetings.
districts and talk to the leadership. We'll establish key personnel and set up
communications channels.
We have to become a team and I think that as a result of the Z team getting
We want
to know a region we will get a chance to interact with other members.
to get to know our regions and we want them to get to know us, so that the idea
of a team is not just a term but a reality.
.
.
It is clear from the outset that team leaders envisioned diverse strategies
toward the environment.
amount of interaction
,
These strategies differed on several dimensions: 1)
or how much interaction with the field would occur--a
lot or a little; 2) method of information gathering
about getting data to put together
a
,
or how the group would go
map of the external environment--either
use information that members already had or go out into the field and seek new
information; and 3) type of interaction
,
or the way in which men±>ers would
approach the environment- -inform the field of the team's intentions, parade
about so as to get to be known and be able to observe the environment, or
actively probe and test plans with those outside the team.
Table
1
reports our
assessment of where each group falls on these dimensions.
In short,
a
strategy of informing (Victor) involves plans for low levels of
interaction early on, but more later when outsiders would be told of the team's
17
decisions.
A strategy of parading (Walter and Xena) includes plans for a lot
of external interaction for the sake of visibility in the environment.
Regional plans
f-cr
teams following these two strategies would come from
information that team members already had, or that could be obtained in the
department.
A strategy of probing (Yurgen and Zoro)
,
by contrast, would mean
a
high level of interactive contact with the environment to revise team knowledge
of the region and meet customer demands.
Strategy Implementation
Despite the best laid plans of mice and men....
While the last section
identified the different strategies that team leaders had for their teams, here
we report on the actual interaction between teams and their regions and the
commissioners office, as well as internal processes.
Victor, A Strategy of Informing
The questionnaire data, log data, interviews,
team meetings, and
observation all indicate that the V team, in fact, had little interaction with
the external environment,
resulting in its inability to diagnose the needs of
the region or top management.
Internal processes were highly conflictual.
Throughout the observation period the V team did not do very much informing; it
maintained an internal focus.
The questionnaire data indicate that the V
Interaction with the Region.
team had a hard time early on figuring out the needs of its region, while the
log data show that it made fewer visits to the region than any other team (see
Table 2).
(N=l),
The V team also had the lowest response rate to the questionnaire
so we interviewed a team member in March.
interaction with the regions was
a
She indicated that
problem, reporting that "there are few
requests from the schools, and so team members have not gone to visit
schools."
In May,
another team member reported that team members had gone to
18
Superintendent meetings, but "just to listen, not to exchange ideas."
Interaction with the Commissioner's Office.
Table
3
reports on the
questionnaire items assessing interaction with the commissioner's office.
The
V team has the lowest scores, indicating that members had a difficult time
determining management expectations, formulating team goals that are congruent
with organizational goals, and communicating with the commissioner's office.
The two interviewees expressed a negative view of the coirunissioner and
organizational red tape.
One team member reported that at the last meeting
Victor was heard to say that the commissioner constrained group activity and
that meetings with the VC were a waste of time.
In April, during the "show
and tell" session, Victor reported difficulty in gaining group member
commitment.
The commissioner heard that Victor was having problems and asked
if he could help.
Soon after this meeting the Commissioner began to refer to
Victor's team as the "problem team,"
a
label that had gained wide acceptance
throughout the organization by May.
Internal Process.
Victor's major goal had been to create effective
internal communication and to clarify within the team the nebulous goals that
had been handed down.
Team observations, however, indicate that the V team
experienced many meeting cancellations attributable to poor attendance, poor
meeting preparation, high levels of conflict, and challenges to Victor's
leadership.
At the May meeting, team members angrily called for outside
facilitation or rotating leadership.
Walter and Xena, A Strategy of Parading
Although Walter and Xena planned to be very visible, parading does not
describe them fully.
The W team did not parade in the regions; it had little
contact with the regions, did not initiate programs, and mapped the environment
from existing member knowledge.
The team did have a high level of
19
confrontation with the commissioner's office.
The X team was very visible in
the regions but remained relatively isolated from top management.
Both teams
had smooth, internal processes with efficient problem solving.
Interaction with the Regions.
The questionnaire and log data show very
different patterns of interaction with the region for these two teams (see
Table 2).
The W team had scores resembling the informing team,
in that there
was difficulty in predicting the needs of the region and low frequency of
interaction with the school districts.
In contrast,
the X team reported good
prediction of regional needs and made more than twice as many visits to the
school districts.
A final interview with a member of the W team in May suggested that its low
level of interaction with the school districts was a result of Walter's notion
that the superintendents already knew the department so it was not necessary to
waste their time with meetings.
The respondent noted some frustration on the
part of team members because "the field is waiting (for us)
and we're waiting
to be told (by top management) what to do out there."
Xena and her team members were actively involved going out in the districts
and sitting in on meetings.
There was also some assistance given to an
elementary school project as early as February.
One team member questioned the
value of going to superintendent meetings because they addressed district, not
team,
agendas.
Nonetheless, the X team was more active in going out into the
field than the previous teams were, and Xena met her goal of visibility.
Interaction with the Conunissioner
'
s
Office.
The data indexing interaction
with the commissioner's office are more difficult to interpret.
The W and X
teams fall between the informing and probing teams on their ratings of how hard
it is to determine management expectations,
on making group goals congruent
with organization goals, and on communicating the ideas and concerns of team
20
members upward (see Table 3).
Team W has better scores than team X, but other
data sources tell of a very different type of relationship between each team
and the commissioner's office.
The W team was quite vocal in its irritation with top management.
Walter
had been the one to set up the eventually banned team leader meetings, and he
became very outspoken in his continued resentment over intrusion from above.
Fighting for the power he thought the teams ought to have took up a lot of his
time and energy.
He chaired the first two "official" team leader meetings and
challenged the VC numerous times, e.g. "How did this deadline get established
when we were not asked about it?"
throughout our observation.
Walter's statement, "We are adults and want to
solve our own problems..." became
tenure as team leader.
Conflict between the two persisted
a
theme that Walter carried throughout his
W team members also exhibited some resentment toward
the commissioner, with one interviewee complaining about the "mindless tasks"
that the commissioner assigned.
In contrast, Xena, whose team was very visible in the districts, played a
very minor role inside the organization.
and missed several of them.
still waiting for direction.
She was quiet at team leader meetings
Yet when we left in May, Xena and her team were
She also was annoyed at the intrusion of the
commissioner in the team's affairs, yet wanted to be told what to do.
Both the W and X teams placed team building as a high
Internal Process.
priority.
The data indicate that they did become well-structured, contented
groups with facilitative leaders, whose only complaint was that they were not
doing enough in the field.
Both groups spent
a
fair amount of meeting time discussing information from
the team leader meetings and in joint action planning.
District profiles were
put together in both teams, and directions from Walter were to "come prepared
21
to share everything you know about the districts of the day."
During team
meetings, observers noted that both team leaders encouraged open discussion and
disagreement, although one or two members sometimes dominated meetings.
Yurgen and Zoro, A Strategy of Probing
The Y and Z teams were the most involved and proactive both in the regions
and with the commissioner's office.
Members on these teams interacted in
a
more dyadic fashion and less as a full group than the other teams.
Interaction with the Regions.
and Z teams showed
a
The questionnaire data indicate that the Y
relatively high ability to predict regional needs and had
more contact with the regions than the other teams (see Table 2).
particularly the case for team Z.
This is
Meeting observations indicate that team
members were the most active in projects and closest to the pulse of current
issues in the field and in the organization.
At the April progress report to the VC Yurgen spoke of great advances on
school evaluation project.
a
The commissioner saw this as a great example of
During the final May interview it was reported that
initiation in the field.
each team member had the task of informing Yurgen of important events in the
district.
The interviewee saw the team as proactive mainly because the whole
team went to a district to describe a new program it had designed.
At the April session Zoro talked about superintendent meetings, about
events in the regions, and about activities that his
in the region,
including
a
mertJaers
were involved with
communication network he was designing.
In the May
interview, a team member reported that Zoro was frequently on the telephone
with the "noisiest people in the district, so at least some of them think we
are marvelous."
Another plan was to assign one team member to each district as
an intermediary.
Interaction with the Commissioner's Office.
22
Both Yurgen and Zoro were very
involved with the commissioner's office.
The questionnaire data indicate that
teams Y and Z had the highest scores on determining management expectations,
formulating goals congruent with organizational goals, and communicating with
the commissioner's office
(see Table 3).
When the commissioner formulated and
assigned the task of reporting promising practices, Yurgen told his team he
would take their comments and suggestions directly to the commissioner, rather
than complaining or resisting like some of the other team leaders.
He earned a
good reputation with the other team leaders and the commissioner's office when
he chaired the third team leader meeting and leaders rated it as their most
effective.
Yurgen "kept to the agenda while having people participate," one
leader noted.
Zoro also initiated activity.
When the commissioner did not schedule an
organization-wide day for team meetings, Zoro pushed the team leaders to take
charge themselves, an idea he planned to discuss with the commissioner.
Following the April progress meeting the commissioner commended both Yurgen and
Zoro for being proactive in their regions.
Internal Processes.
Team meeting notes indicate that both the Y and Z
teams spent the bulk of their time sharing information about current events in
school districts and about promising practices.
Both team leaders appear to
have been much more directive than the other team leaders.
Early in February, several members noted that internal communications were
a
problem in the Y team; members had been missing meetings and often did not
know what other members were doing.
Observation of
a
meeting late in February
appeared to show some improvement when members discussed common needs in the
region.
Still, Yurgen often communicated one-on-one with team members between
meetings rather than to everyone in the meetings.
a "chairman"
His style was called that of
who enabled the team to take initiative: "He gets requests from
23
the field or generates ideas and asks a particular individual to do a piece of
the work."
Zoro also was
a
directive leader.
Meetings appeared to be problem solving
sessions; team members discussed the aspects of the organization that were
hampering their work and what to do about it, or how to help
with
a
a
The May interviewee
Between meetings Zoro also was active.
already been made.
person to do it.
district deal
Observation showed that Zoro tended to present plans that had
problem.
noted "he makes
a
determination of what is needed and tries to get the right
He
'
s
a
strong leader who knows the steps and therefore should
be followed.
Outcomes
Although admittedly it was difficult to evaluate success in the first few
months of the project, we asked members to evaluate their teams in the February
questionnaire and in the May interviews.
Internal Evaluation.
The questionnaire results indicate that the V team
was the most dissatisfied and the least cohesive (see Table 4).
interview
a
During the May
member complained that the team had not been able to get anything
done because of internal conflicts.
The questionnaire results show that in February the W and X teams had the
highest ratings on individual satisfaction and group cohesiveness.
particularly high for the X team.
Scores were
Indications that this pattern held, but that
external activity was problematic, were raised in the May interview.
This
reaction is from an interviewee in Walter's group but could be interchanged
with many of the comments from Xena's team member: "We're
team.
a
good regional
We have a good leader, we have good people, we do our homework, we have
information about our region.
and Walter is a good leader.
.
.meetings are a strength, we're a cohesive team,
He's democratic, tolerant of opposition, brings
24
us exactly what he gets, and handles people well.
The only problem is a lack
of a specific mission in the field, no sense of priorities."
The Y and Z -teams,
the probing strategy, have satisfaction and cohesiveness
scores that fall between the informing and the probing teams.
May that a Y member reported "we're beginning to be more like
It was not until
a
team."
The Z
team member rated his team as doing just what it was supposed to do.
External Evaluation
.
In February 1984
I
returned to the department for
some external performance ratings (see Table 5).
I
asked the commissioner and
the head of human resources to rank order the teams based on their performance
and to explain the ranking.
The commissioner told me that the team concept was
finally taking hold, although it had taken a long time.
In separate
interviews, both the commissioner and head of human resources gave me the same
rank ordering of teams, except that they reversed their top two ratings.
Neither respondent thought that the intervals between teams were even.
Both rated the V team way below all the others.
as "the classic case of what not to do."
Its performance was seen
The V team was characterized as
reactive rather than proactive and as the only failing team.
next to the bottom.
It had suffered high turnover.
The W team was
The commissioner commented
furthermore that the team had deferred to one of its members who had strong
field experience.
This turned out to be a mistake, for the information
received this way was not always accurate.
Walter grew very frustrated with
the limitations of his role, abdicated leadership, and eventually resigned as
leader.
The X team had the next highest rating.
Its members were seen as
happy and committed, and they satisfied many of the local superintendents.
But
the commissioner reported that they had not done "a damn thing," they were just
happy to be with each other.
The team met with superintendents who didn't
understand why they were meeting.
25
The two highest ranking teams were the Y and Z teams, both of which were
rated quite superior to the other teams.
"super job."
abilities.
The Y team was thought to have done a
Yurgen was good at "developing the team and he stretches their
He has in-depth knowledge of the schools, and his school
evaluations were
a
prototype for the rest of the organization."
also seen as having done great work.
This team did some school evaluations
and "told the truth, which made some people angry.
with
a
The Z team was
But they did a thorough job
The team also assigned people to districts, so there
good end result.
is one person to contact.
This has really made a difference."
These findings were not fully corroborated by the survey the department
gave to randomly selected superintendents (see Table 5).
Superintendents were
asked to compare the service they were now getting to that of the year before,
and to evaluate the extent to which they could get the help they needed.
The
data suggest that while team V lagged behind the other groups, teams X and Z
helped the districts the most.
The commissioner did not credit the survey
much, however, because of low response rates.
The results were not included in
formal team evaluations and a new survey of the superintendents was planned for
the future.
DISCUSSION
This research set out to build on Gersick's research (1988) examining the
interaction process between teams and their environments.
The goals here
included identifying the actual content of strategies toward the environment,
examining the role of the environment in influencing teams, and proposing
relationships among external activity, internal process, and team performance.
Categorizing Team-Context Interaction
The first goal of this research was to document team strategies toward the
external environment.
We were able to differentiate three initial strategies
26
and to monitor the implementation of those strategies (see Table
summary of strategies, activities, and performance ratings).
team had little -outside contact.
6
for a
The informing V
It made decisions about how to serve the
environment using existing member knowledge, and discouraged initiatives from
This was intentional, as was the team's concentration on internal
the field.
team building.
But, contrary to plan. Team V ended up fully occupied with
internal conflicts and never quite got to informing outsiders--either the field
or top management--of its plans for action.
The team followed more of an
isolation strategy,- not responding to external offers of help and buffering
itself from outsiders.
The parading W and V teams were each seen and responsive to some part of
the external environment.
They exhibited
teams can vary their external activities.
mixed approach, indicating that
a
For example,
the W team had minimal
contact with its region and relied on existing member knowledge (isolation),
while maintaining high levels of visibility within the organization
(parading)
.
The team moved beyond simple visibility to confrontation and
conflict with top management.
The mixed approach also is seen in the X team,
which was visible in the field (reflecting
a
high level of outside contact to
observe meetings and practices), and isolated from top management.
Both the Y and Z teams planned to follow
all outsiders.
a
probing strategy and did so with
These teams did not use existing
menrtber
knowledge, alone, to
map the external environment; members were encouraged to bring in new data with
a
view of the demands of the new task.
These teams had the highest level of
external contact, were proactive not only in testing potential interventions
but also in actually implementing new programs, and presented an image to the
field and to top management that they were doing
overall interactive approach.
27
a
good job.
They epitomize an
The data show us three types of interaction with outsiders-'isolation
(formerly called informing), parading, and probing--differing on key
These three strategies can be interpreted as different assumptions
dimensions.
toward learning.
contemplation
:
Isolation means learning about the outside world through
if you leave us alone to think and discuss, we will tell you
what you need when we have figured it out.
observation
Parading means learning through
The message here is that we want to watch you,
.
and to respond to your needs.
to let you know that we are around,
probing means following
a
to understand you,
Finally,
learning style captured in the epigram of one of
Piaget's followers, "Penser, c'est operer," or to think is to operate.
learning is through experimentation
,
Here
trying out an idea and seeing the
reaction, making an intervention and evaluating the result.
This style appears
to improve members understanding of means-ends relationships and allow it to
accommodate to
a
more extensive, changing world.
The Role of the Environment
Thus far
I
have described a group as
toward the external environment.
a
free actor following its strategy
However, this is much too simple.
In reality
the environment reacts to the team and then both team and context mutually
influence each other.
Interaction between the group and its environment has
patterns similar to that between the members and the group itself.
The themes of power and influence appear to play an important role in
group-environment relations.
top management comes to
a
The teams begin to act and through their actions
clearer idea of what it wants the teams to do, e.g.,
leaders should not meet by themselves but with the VC, teams should not have
varying interventions but should concurrently implement promising practices.
As top management begins to set constraints for the teams and to direct their
activities power struggles ensue.
Teams that overtly fight the direction end
28
up frustrated (Walter), while those that try to shape top management directives
to be in line with their own plans,
and vice versa (Yurgen)
,
find themselves
held up as models of appropriate task behavior.
Throughout this process of negotiating who is in charge, what will the task
be,
and how will performance be judged, there is
over control.
a
great deal of ambivalence
Some teams resist interference but want to be told what to do.
The commissioner wants to give the teams autonomy, but constrains team
behavior.
With the commissioner's ambivalence in this case, it may have been
inevitable that one team was the scapegoat and others were able to shine.
Thus,
the environment influences the team by setting limits on activity and by
using examples from particular teams to help define the task and performance.
Teams influence the environment by shaping that definition of task and
performance.
The external environment plays yet another role: that of echo chamber.
News of the teams, what they are doing, how well they are doing it, gets fed
into the rest of the organization and amplified.
Early patterns appear to
remain intact, with teams unable to change the reports about them.
While the V
team's troubles are told to the team leaders and the VC, the commissioner and
the rest of the organization also hear them.
If it had been in bad shape
before, the V team is surely in trouble now because it has a reputation.
On
the positive side, when the Y team is praised as a model for school evaluation,
and the Z team is congratulated for telling the truth to the superintendents,
this news reinforces the positive image, making it easier for the teams to
continue on the right track.
The environment changes the whispers it hears into roars, underlining the
importance of profile management in teams.
Teams have to manage the
information and images they send out because these are the images they will see
29
These images appear to get cast in concrete, and new
reflected around them.
data is interpreted to support the images, e.g., the superintendent ratings are
discounted.
It is important to note that different parts of the environment do
not necessarily share the same perceptions and evaluations of the team, e.g.,
the commissioner and the superintendents.
In this case,
it is top management,
not the customer, who has the largest impact on team evaluation, future team
design, and rewards.
Process and Performance
Perhaps the most intriguing finding of this research is that external
behavior seems to have
If we had
large impact on team performance ratings.
a
predicted performance using the traditional internal model, teams V, W, and X
would have seemed prime candidates for top ratings.
Their leaders plan to be
participative and have members actively engaged in debate and decision making.
Goal clarity and member satisfaction are seen as important goals.
Yet the V
team fails, and while members of the W and X team rate their satisfaction high
early on performance, as rated by top management, is highest in teams Y and Z.
The key proposition from this study is that teams dependent on outsiders
and facing new tasks will be rated by outsiders as the highest performers if
they emphasize external probing activities.
Such teams can understand the
demands of outsiders and initiate interventions in the field.
They do not
presume to understand their constituents, but venture out to revise old
assumptions in light of
a
new charter.
adequate for former tasks, in
a
While such assumptions may have been
new endeavor the rules have changed.
Finally,
those who probe can promote the team and its activities to those who evaluate
performance.
The opening of the group's boundaries for probing activities may have some
The cost of probing in this study was
negative effects on internal processes.
30
low cohesion and satisfaction in the short run.
external activity takes up
a
A high level of interactive
lot of time and brings divergent views into the
group, which may. inhibit team building.
Groups with an external emphasis may
run the risk of becoming underbounded (Alderfer,
1976); having external
knowledge but not enough cohesion to motivate members to pull different
perspectives together.
Teams in this study overcame this problem through
directive leadership that held them together until common experiences in the
field provided solidarity.
The teams that are visible in part of the external environment, but that
are not as proactive with outsiders, are seen as mid-range performers.
teams achieve more of a balance of internal and external activities.
teams,
These
For these
the more limited time and identification with outsiders, and even
antagonism toward outsiders (W team), coexists with internal cohesion and
satisfaction.
Yet,
these teams appear to run the risk of becoming overbounded,
of letting their internal views and loyalties promote a "we versus them"
mentality (Sherif, 1966) and negative external stereotypes (Janis, 1982).
Cohesion for these teams may be limited to the short term if they cannot meet
external demands.
Still,
these teams meet some external demands by watching
outsiders and reacting to their needs.
Furthermore, these teams raise the
possibility that teams can satisfy both sets of demands.
Finally, the data suggest that teams that are isolated from their
environment have a high probability of failing.
as lacking leadership skills,
Although Victor is described
it is possible that no leader can help a group
that maintains isolation from those upon whom it is dependent.
It is difficult
to have a primary goal of defining the team, with no data on external
expectations.
In short,
Internal conflict arises from ignorance about the outside world.
I
argue that a probing strategy toward the environment will
31
produce the highest performance in teams that must serve the needs of outsiders
and that are evaluated by those outsiders.
For groups facing a new, externally
dependent task, it appears most effective in the long run to emphasize external
activities first, even at the expense of short-term cohesion.
Early on these
teams can develop a rudimentary structure and some basic cohesion to organize
themselves to diagnose and test plans for serving outside needs.
Later, their
cohesion will depend on affirmative interaction with the environment rather
than on an ability to get along with one another.
Future research will have to
test whether complex internal and external processes can develop concurrently.
Implications
This study has both managerial and theoretical implications.
For managers,
the clear-cut conclusion is that initial team building needs to be tailored to
the group's task.
The balance between internal and external focus depends on
how much the team needs outside resources, support, or information.
Despite
teams that automatically take an exclusively
the advice of current texts,
Teams
internal focus may find themselves lower performers in the long run.
with external evaluators, task allocators, and clients may find that developing
externally focused roles is as important as developing internal process skills
(Ancona & Caldwell, 1988).
This is not a strategy that all groups implicitly
follow, so organizations may want to expose team leaders to the external
perspective.
Furthermore, teams need to learn to monitor and manage their
external profiles if only because the external organization magnifies the image
that the team presents to it.
From a theoretical point of view, this study elaborates on the process of
team-context interaction.
It calls for studying individuals in groups, but
adds another level of analysis, groups in organizations.
including
a
It calls for
new set of variables in group research, specifically,
32
a
group's
approach to its external environment,
a
group's mix of internal and external
processes, and modes of environmental influence on group behavior.
Finally,
it
calls for investigating the mutual influence of environmental constraint and
team action.
Although it is difficult to distinguish which of forceful
leadership, or updating information about the field, or initiating activity, or
promoting the team to top management, caused probing teams to be rated as high
performers, clearly some of these activities make
a
difference.
Future
research is needed to confirm and expand the findings of this study, including
statistical clustering of activities into external strategies and testing the
relationships among processes and performance.
Research can now focus on
larger samples and more diverse tasks, with an emphasis on hypothesis testing.
Results here suggest that this move will be worthwhile.
The findings in this study come from a small sample; five groups within one
organization, doing one task.
many organizational groups.
Yet the teams in this study share traits with
New product teams, organizational task forces, and
strategic decision making groups are just
a
few examples of teams that face
unstructured tasks and high external demands.
All such teams may require
theoretical lens highlighting team-context interaction for adequate
understanding.
33
a
new
NOTES
Both refer to
The term teams is used here interchangeably with groups.
others as a
who
themselves
as
a
group,
are
seen
by
see
set of individuals
designated
by the
achieve
a
task
work
interdependently
to
group, and must
&
Morris,
Ancona,
1987).
(Hackman
1975;
organization
1.
a
Although much of the work on group process tends to view the group as a
closed system, separated from the organizational context, this is clearly a
For example, work in the
generalization for which there are exceptions.
accounts
for team interaction with
(Colman
&
Bexton,
1975)
tradition
Tavistock
community
the team borders.
larger
beyond
figures
and
the
authority
external
discuss
goal
formulation
in relation to
often
process
models
addition,
group
In
external demands (Schein, 1988). However, by and large these are exceptions to
the rule and the group process literature must speak to the absence of work on
team-context interaction.
2.
The external perspective builds on a shift in level of analysis that has
taken place in organization theory where resource dependence, population
ecology, and interorganizational theorists have studied organizations
functioning within environments, rather than merely as settings for managerial
functioning (see Aldrich & Pfeffer, 1976; McKelvey, 1982; Whetten, 1983).
Studies have shown that organizations not only adapt to environmental demands,
but that they also mold, enact, and manage their dependence on others or fall
prey to the forces of environmental selection (Astley & Van de Ven, 1983).
3.
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